Reading Round-up 2013: week 18

Cute little board book featuring a series of adult animals asking baby animals if they are theirs. The first baby each adult asks is clearly the wrong kind of animal, but underneath a large flag is the correct one. It’s a simple board book and a common theme, but the execution is enough to make this version stand out.

(Despite the use of comic sans. Really, people? comic sans?)

All Creatures Great and Small by Naoko Stoop

As a general rule, I find most Christian board books to be authoritarian, overly sappy, and not very well written. While I’ll grant you that the first may be a matter of personal preference, the truth is that most Christian books for very young children are more concerned with message than language, and the illustrations lean more towards a bland sort of precious than anything with character.

This particular board book is very much the exception. The words are, of course from the lovely hymn All Things Bright an Beautiful. And while the illustrations are the roundish sort of cute so often found in books for little ones, they have personality as well, and a wonderful variety of colors throughout the book. Highly recommended.

Baby Loves to Rock! by Wednesday Kirwan

The fox likes to trot and the weasel likes to pop, but who likes to ROCK? Baby does!

The rhymes are nice and the illustrations are bright, but it doesn’t really flow as you read it aloud. Cute, but not a must buy.

1, 2 At the Zoo by Sue DiCicco

Bright Illustrations, big flaps, and lots of repetition make this counting book a solid choice, but not quite memorable.